To the White Girl Who Broke the Law and Got Away With It
A personal journey from disdain to compassion
You know the girl — the popular, blond-haired modelesque girl that everyone wants to be. She’s front and center, loves the attention, and thrives in the spotlight. You hate the girl because you secretly want to be her.
I’m one week into a month-long in-person yoga teacher training course on a peaceful island in the south of Thailand. I knew that the experience would be an emotionally and physically exhausting one, but there was an incident on the first week here that contributed even more to the toll.
In our group of 23, only three people are considered Thai — I’ll include myself in this count. I was born here, but grew up American; I’ve always occupied the space between cultures, never quite enough for each one and somehow always end up being categorized into the other when it’s least convenient.
The other 20 in the group are foreigners from all corners of the world, some of whom live and work in Thailand and others of whom have flown to Thailand just for the training. Those who live in Thailand already have a general understanding of the country's culture — how to act respectfully, what the food is like, what’s appropriate, and what’s not. And generally, those who just arrived have quickly…
